


The Spaces Inbetween

by aionimica



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Communication, F/M, Force Bond (Star Wars), Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-14
Updated: 2020-02-14
Packaged: 2021-02-28 05:42:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,272
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22608727
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aionimica/pseuds/aionimica
Summary: It wasn’t the first time. Not the first since Crait and she saw him kneeling and their eyes met with anger and ache and want and everything else they didn’t have to say. No. Not the first, nor the second, nor even the third. This was a well trodden path that they all walked over and over. As if the Force was taking their hands and despite both of them tearing it away, still trying to bring them together.---Rey and Kylo have been dealing with the Force bond for some time, but it finally reaches a tipping point.
Relationships: Kylo Ren/Rey, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 6
Kudos: 57
Collections: For one is both and both are one in love: The Reylo Fanfiction Anthology's Valentine's Day Exchange





	The Spaces Inbetween

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Ayrith](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ayrith/gifts).



> Happy Valentine's Day!
> 
> Prompt (sort of a combo between these two) :)
> 
> Prompt - Post TLJ - force bond moments (doesn’t need to to be TROS compliant)  
> Prompt - Any inspired canon divergence at any point in the sequel trilogy — with Happy ending for Ben/Rey. :)
> 
> I hope you enjoy!

It’s so much easier to hide in the dark. Light is aggravating – all knowing, too bright. The dark is quieter, simpler. Not to mention that in the dark, the weight of the world seems to lift away and all that’s left behind is the weight of yourself.

And in the dark, Rey can pretend that nothing’s changed.

The lights are off as she stares up at the ceiling. She’s alone, which is neither new nor unusual, but it’s still… alone. Outside her quarters, Resistance fighters walk from one end of the cruiser to the other – a moment of peace found as they make their way across the galaxy. She was one of thousands on the ship – Finn and Rose weren’t far and even BB-8 came to check on her when she falls too far within herself. Most days, she prefers it this way – it’s familiar, even though it’s been so long since she was last alone.

It doesn’t matter how long it’s been – alone still hurts.

Her eyes snap open when she feels him appear, that familiar brush against her mind as the rest of the world goes still around her. Sound fades until it’s just them. The sounds of their breath. His; calm, still, restrained to the point of raggedness. Hers; so quiet, she might as well not be breathing at all.

A beat passes. And then another.

And another.

He breaks the silence first. It’s not urgency that lists in his voice; instead it’s a weariness that betrays the inevitable – the constant topic that they always find themselves falling back on: “What do you want?”

“You know this doesn’t work like that,” Rey says dully. It’s never worked like that. Never has it been something that they chose to do when they wanted to see the other, though those moments were equally fleeting; quiet moments in the dark when all she craved was a voice who understood – moments that only fade when she tries to comfort herself with her own hand and can’t help but feel unsatisfied.

She feels him turn, that odd sixth sense that she’s always known to rise when someone else’s gaze crosses hers. She swallowed. “Can you see me?” she asked.

His answer comes low and hoarse, a quiet, “No.”

Rey purses her lips and glances away. “Good.”

Confusion drifts between them, tenuous along their bond. It’s akin to frustration in that it mixes with awkwardness, before landing at hesitance. They’ll wait – there isn’t anything they can do to make it go away, save for time.

Rey shifts and sits. Force, she’s glad it’s dark. The thought of facing him now hits her with a rawness that gnaws at her chest. They each have their walls they’ve so carefully constructed, building them brick by brick as the other continually chipped away to get to the heart. Even if she tried, she can’t keep him out. But at least now, with the lights off, he has to imagine how the emotion would play across her face.

But she doesn’t need to see him to know how he looks – rather, how he looks at her. It’s indescribable, how familiar it is. She doesn’t have to imagine the bags under his eyes or the hard line of his lips as they pressed together as he followed her outline in the dark. Nor does she have to imagine the way his gaze will follow her, like a lifeline, waiting for a way to reel her in.

She should expect it: they’ve danced in this way too many times to count. They’d sit in silence until the Force started to wear thin and then it would fade away, both of them back to where they were, for better or for worse.

It wasn’t the first time. Not the first since Crait and she saw him kneeling and their eyes met with anger and ache and want and everything else they didn’t have to say. No. Not the first, nor the second, nor even the third. This was a well trodden path that they all walked over and over. As if the Force was taking their hands and despite both of them tearing it away, still trying to bring them together.

Well the Force was wrong.

“Let’s not pretend this is anything but what it is, alright?” She sits up and stares at the dark. He stiffens, his mental walls bracing against her sudden outburst. “Let’s not pretend you haven’t been willing to shoot us out of the sky any chance you get. You’ve been hunting us down like dogs and—”

“I didn’t.”

“You’ve tried.” She couldn’t see his face, but she knew he saw her then. She felt it, the way he bristled against her rage. Confusion and… hurt and his own anger flaring in return. This was not their usual dance, but Force did it feel good.

“Yes, I did try,” he said lowly, a rage barely kept in check. “Just like you tried to kill me every chance you had. Remember Hurian and Starkiller? And how could I forget Ipierian? I was willing to let you go, but you ran in, lightsaber blazing and—"

“Not every chance,” Rey says begrudgingly.

He smiled at her grimly. “Right. And look how well that brought us.”

“We’re at war!

“Exactly my point. Now you know why all of this arguing is useless and—"

Rey rolls her eyes. “Oh, don’t use that tone with me.”

“What?”

“That Supreme Leader voice.” Rey shakes her head, gritting her teeth. “You always pull that out when you think you’re better. But you’re not. You’re just alone and sad and—”

“And you aren’t?” Rey stiffens. He continues, his whole body moving in shadow, controlled yet chaotic. “I know you Rey.  _ I know you _ . And I know you try to forget that, but I know you better than anyone. I can’t stop this – I can’t stop from seeing what you give away and you’re not subtle. You find me when you’re alone at night – even when the bond is closed because you’re there in my head and I can’t get fucking get away. And I thought I found someone who understood what it was like to have nothing and when you saw what I was, you ran away. And I still can’t get away from you! Because you’re there and I can’t stop wanting it, even when I know I shouldn’t. You want this to end? So do I, because I don’t know what else you want? What do you want, Rey? What do you want from me that I could possibly give?”

“To be better!” Tears run down her cheeks as she holds back a sob. “Because I can’t hate you, even when I should hate you with every ounce that I have and everyone expects me to hate you. I can’t hate you, when you know me better than anyone. I can’t hate you when you hear my thoughts when I do – how can I hate someone who knows me as myself and still doesn’t run at every chance they get?”

She inhales sharply, wiping tears and spit from her chin. “I hate this fucking thing.”

There was no comfort in knowing that she felt him just as he felt her. She could feel every word land against him. She feels every angle of truth in her words, just as she feels every angle of knife that she twisted against him. He has his rage and his anger, burning hot, but hers burns cold, waiting for the moment to strike.

“Force, why did it have to be you?” Anger turned to pain that furrowed between her brows, blurring the world between them as she fell to her knees. “I know you so well, and I can’t hate you. You know how it is… We’re at war and I can’t hate you. I sometimes even think I l—”

She catches herself as she realizes he’s followed her down to the floor, kneeling at her side. She just lets the tears come and whispers through, “I hate that I miss you, Ben.”

She always calls him Ben. Never anything else. It started mockingly, angrily as their bond forced them to see each other. It gave her some small satisfaction in the beginning to see him recoil when his name hit his ears, but over time it went away. And what was left was a crack in his wall, where his face softened and the years fell away and they were both left bare in its wake. Ben was their word and he belonged to her alone.

He opens his mouth, closes it, and looks away before a quiet, “I hate that I miss you too.”

Hate is a fleeting emotion, leaving emptiness and weariness behind. Fatigue hung heavy between them. Their eyes meet. Both still. Rey swallows, blinking back tears.

“You know I’d do anything for you, Rey,” he says softly. “Always have…”

“You killed for me,” she says with a bitter laugh. “I can’t forget that…”

“Neither can I.” And when he speaks, he says it with such a quiet intensity that Rey looks away. He killed Snoke for her, and in some ways, set them both free. “I gave it all for you. And I… Why didn’t you want it?”

“I wanted your hand,” she admits quietly. He looks at her suddenly, the walls falling away. Her face breaks as she can’t keep the tears back anymore. “Ben’s hand.”

“And now…” his breath catches, his own eyes shining, “where does that leave us?”

Rey wipes the tears from her eyes. “I don’t know, I –” She glances his way as he steps in the space between them, closing it as he bends down and leans in with a kiss.

Small and quick, chaste, but charged with so much – want and desire, enough to fuel a star for millennia was stored in his hands as he holds her and grounds them both down. Light and darkness flashes across her vision - their meeting in the forest cutting to her standing over him in the snow – their first bond and then their second and that rush of truth as they stood side by side against Snoke’s guards – and every fleeting moment since then.

And then flashes of the future: that same rush of truth as they stood out on a planet, looking towards a distant sunset – the fire of passion as he braces himself above her, her hands never getting enough of his skin – the two of them together, endlessly, at peace, watching over a galaxy that didn’t know what to do with them

As fast as it came, it went, punctuating the promise of what to come. He lets go, but Rey reaches out to hold him close, only to find him shaking. She shakes her head as the world comes back to focus.

“What… what was that?” Ben holds onto her, as if he let her go, he’d let go of what little grasp he has left on the world. “What does this mean?”

What could she say? She glances up, speechless. “I don’t know… I… I saw… us.”

“But that was real – that was – is – could be real?” He looks at her pleadingly. “Right? As long as I… If I… If you?”

She buries her face into his shirt. His smell leaks through the fabric, muted across the stars and yet still there all the same. “If you leave, you’ll join me right? That’s what you saw?”

He nods mutely. “Then that’s what’ll happen. That’s what I saw,” she says quietly. “We’ll be together. And you’ll be with me and I’ll be with you and—"

The last time they were in this place, they saw a vision – two sides of a coin. The Force learned since then, apparently. This time they both saw the same. And this time, there was no lie.

“It’s not that easy. I… I don’t know how I can…” His voice was broken, hoarse. Light glistened off his face – the remnants of tears on his skin. She presses her forehead against his, offering what strength she has.  _ You’ll be mine. _

They were always each other’s – no matter how long they tried to deny it. The Force decided that long ago.

And as if pleased with what it had accomplished, the distant hum of the lightspeed engines begin to register: the bond wearing thin as the world around them started to come back into focus.  _ Please _ , Rey begs whoever out there might be listening,  _ let this work _ .

“I don’t know where to go,” he finishes as he looks out to something in his own world.

Tentatively Rey reaches out, grasping for his hand in the dark. Calloused fingers meet her own and she holds on tight. He stiffens at her touch, but his gaze never drops. Slowly Rey lifts his hand to her lips.

“You know where to find me,” she whispers. It wouldn’t be hard for either of them to find the other. They shine out in their minds, brighter than stars. She projects it into his hand, across the stars to wherever he sits. “Come and find me, Ben. Please.”

“I do,” he says breathlessly, a hand rising up to her cheek though it never makes it before he fades away.

Closing her eyes, Rey falls back on her bed, curling up in on herself, every part of her plummeting, wondering what has she done.

And then the smallest brushes of hope brushes against her mind and suddenly she feels a surge of resolution in her veins as a voice not her own – his voice – Ben’s – reaches her and says,

_ I will _ .

**Author's Note:**

> you can find me on twitter/tumblr/pillowfort @aionimica <3
> 
> Please check out the other fics in the collection! They're amazing!


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